Original research articleComparing the relationship between knowledge and support for hydraulic fracturing between residents of the United States and the United Kingdom
Section snippets
Background
Our work examines the relationship between knowledge/familiarity with shale gas and attitudes towards shale gas industry development in a comparative context. The United States (US) and United Kingdom (UK) represent very different cases of shale gas development. Shale gas development is a relatively mature industry in the US, with extraction via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) occurring in many shale gas plays (e.g., the Marcellus in the Northeast, the Barnett in Texas, the Bakken in North
Literature review
Among the myriad comparisons between the US and the UK, which we could address, we focus in particular on the relationship between familiarity/knowledge about shale gas and support/opposition for development of the industry.
Rationale
The contextualist perspective described above provides a solid foundation for our comparative approach to assessing the relationship between knowledge and attitudes. Our engagement is based on our own healthy skepticism for the information deficit model: we agree with many of the theoretical critiques raised above, and note the results specific to shale gas development in the US that also challenge the assumptions of this model. However, a different story seems to emerge in the UK sources
What is the level of knowledge about shale gas development, and how does it differ between the general population of the US and the UK?
UK respondents demonstrated far higher knowledge (as indicated by answering the item correctly) than US respondents. Among US respondents, 33% answered correctly, 40% said that they did not know, and 27% answered incorrectly (Table 2). In the UK, 72% answered correctly, 19% said they did not know and only 9% answered incorrectly.
What are the socio-demographic attributes associated with knowledge?
For both the US and the UK, we explore socio-demographic correlates of knowledge. Respondent characteristics were not asked in precise parallel fashion (i.e.,
Discussion
Robust differences exist between the US and UK respondents. We found higher levels of knowledge (answering the screener question correctly) about the shale gas industry in the UK than in the US, but higher levels of support in the US (opposition levels were similar across the two samples, but US respondents were much less likely than UK respondents to say that they did not know whether they supported or opposed development). Regarding the relationship between knowledge and support, we see that
Acknowledgements
Funding for this research was provided by federal formula funds from the US Department of Agriculture, administered through (name withheld for blind review) University, and by the (O'Hara) Group at the University of (Nottingham).
We would also like to thank YouGov for their support in survey administration within the UK and Jessica Andersson-Hudson for her invaluable assistance in data coding and manipulation.
Funding for this research was provided via fellowship funding from the US Environmental
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